University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Proceedings of the Eleventh Vertebrate Pest Vertebrate Pest Conference Proceedings collection Conference (1984) 3-1-1984 BIOLOGICAL RATIONALE FOR 1080 AS A PREDACIDE Walter E. Howard University of California, Davis, California Robert H. Schmidt University of California, Davis, California Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/vpc11 Part of the Environmental Health and Protection Commons Howard, Walter E. and Schmidt, Robert H., "BIOLOGICAL RATIONALE ORF 1080 AS A PREDACIDE" (1984). Proceedings of the Eleventh Vertebrate Pest Conference (1984). Paper 18. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/vpc11/18 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Vertebrate Pest Conference Proceedings collection at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Proceedings of the Eleventh Vertebrate Pest Conference (1984) by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. BIOLOGICAL RATIONALE FOR 1080 AS A PREDACIDE WALTER E. HOWARD and ROBERT H. SCHMIDT, Wildlife and Fisheries Biology, University of California, Davis, California 95616 ABSTRACT: Compound 1080 (sodium monofluoroacetate) is a uniquely selective predacide for controlling coyotes, compared to other predacides. In addition to discussing the biological aspects of 1080, the reasons for the current emotional-political status of 1080 are also reviewed because the biological rationale concerning 1080 has been largely determined by a conspiracy orchestrated in 1972 by an indivi- dual of the Council on Environmental Quality but assisted by others from the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency. Many of the distortions about 1080 can also be traced to environmental organizations which still use 1080 as an issue which they can be "anti" in order to solicit funds from the public. This paper is an attempt to clarify the true biological facts about 1080 and to expose the political conspiracies against 1080 by government and environmental organizations. INTRODUCTION This paper discusses the relative biological merits of Compound 1080 (sodium monofluoroacetate) as a predacide to use in baits to control the coyote (Canis latrans), which is the most serious livestock predator in the United States (Menzies et al. 1982, Wade 1982). In addition, we make a cursory review of the chief political factors which brought about the current gross misunderstanding of this com- pound. Also, we analyze the incorrect and emotionally charged propaganda which has been perpetrated by many environmental organizations in order to entice the public to contribute funds, since many of the distortions about 1080 can be traced to these sources (Howard 1971). Since 1080 is the most selective predacide available to use in baits to control coyotes, we endeavor to clarify the biological facts supporting this selectivity rationale about 1080 and to explain how the perpetrators of the emotional propaganda and political conspiracies against 1080 attained their objectives of banning the use of predacides in 1972. Actually, the general public has been hoodwinked, bamboozled, duped, tricked, deluded or what have you, especially since the early 1970s, into thinking 1080, when used to control coyotes, then kills everything. When did all this start? Compound 1080 was first field tested by the U.S. Fish and Wild- life Service and the California Department of Agriculture in 1945 at the U.S. Forest Service's San Joaquin Experimental Range, Madera County, California. It proved to be a highly effective rodenticide to use against the California ground squirrel (Spermophilus beecheyi) to increase food production during World War II. However, since it was also selective for dogs, an obvious problem existed because there are always people who want to poison their neighbor's dog (e.g., Edwards et al. 1981). Also, no one wanted 1080 to get the bad name thallium sulfate had acquired in its effect on dogs in the 1930s. Since EPA did not exist at that time, it looked like it would be a problem to get 1080 restricted so that only trained officials could use it. Therefore, the best way to achieve this restriction seemed to be to make 1080 look so dangerous that untrained people would not want to use it (personal communica- tion to W.E.H. from the five government and state officials who conducted the 1945 tests). Robert M. Sutton, while Chief of the Branch of Animal Control in the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife, Division of Wildlife Services, admitted that "when 1080 was discovered and brought into use, it was this agency (Division of Wildlife Services) that alerted the public and conducted a widespread educational program to point up the highly lethal nature of the compound. This is as it should be, but we actually caused alarm. Bureau literature described symptoms and lethal dosages. Bureau signs identified areas of use and pointed up hazards" (Sutton 1967:42). The alarmist technique worked, and everyone was sufficiently frightened so that the only officials who wanted to use 1080 for rodent or predator control for many years were those who had no other toxi- cant available that would do the job so effectively and with so few environmental problems (Howard 1983). Later, when individuals and organizations began to object to the killing of any animal, it was only natural that they chose 1080 as a logical target, since the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) of USDI had already frightened most of its own personnel about 1080. Compound 1080 has especially been exploited by the "anti" groups since the start of the strong ecology movement about 1968. For the last 30 years or so, Interior's FWS officials in Washington have not permitted their own animal control research branch, the Denver Wildlife Research Center (DWRC), to carry out research on how to use 1080 for rodent and predator control in a more efficacious and safer way. "Considering the chemical properties of 1080, its full potential as a selective pesticide has not been explored. Research into dosage rates and field application techniques is needed. ...The full potential of this material in terms of selectiveness and other use refinements has never been developed" (Berryman 1974:217). The only research on 1080 that Interior has permitted has been the "toxic collar," a device placed on sheep to control coyotes, and single lethal dose baits for coyotes. One reason why DWRC has not done more research on 1080 is that whoever is appointed as assistant secretary of USDI responsible for animal damage control, by government statute this same person is also in charge of National Parks; hence, a hopeless conflict of interest. Many think that the only way to correct this political problem is to return the responsibility for animal damage control (ADC) and DWRC from Interior to USDA, where it was originally (Howard 1974a). 1984, Proceedings Eleventh Vertebrate Pest Conference 138 (D.O. Clark, Ed.). Printed at Univ. of California, Davis, Calif. WHAT IS 1080? According to Crabtree (1962), monofluoroacetate acid was recognized in Belgium in 1896, but it and its homologs escaped attention until about 1935, when fluoroacetates were developed into rodenticides in Germany before World War II. The major advances with fluoroacetates up to 1939 were made in Belgium, Poland and Germany. A Polish scientist who escaped informed the British in 1942 of the toxicity of methyl fluoroacetate. About 1944 the U.S. Chemical Warfare Service suggested sodium monofluoroacetate be researched as a rodenticide, and this is when Patuxent Wildlife Research Center gave it the invoice number "1080." After further testing at the Denver Wildlife Research Center, it soon became an impor- tant rodenticide and mammalian predacide (Atzert 1971). Compound 1080 is considered practically tasteless, but it may have a faint acetate odor and a mild acid-salty taste, probably from impurities left during the manufacturing process (Atzert 1971, Rammell and Fleming 1978). A black dye (1% nigrosine black) is added so this white powder can be distinguished from sugar, flour or other substances (Clark 1975, Timm 1983). It is not an accumulative poison like arsenic and does not give off poisonous fumes (McIntosh 1958). It decomposes at approximately 200°C, which allows the destruction of unused baits by burning (Crabtree 1962, Atzert 1971). Peters (1975) has shown that when 1080 is applied on baits in forests or pastoral lands the toxin is neither mobile nor persistent, hence exceedingly slender opportunities exist for any significant contamination of susceptible components of the environment. Clark (1975) has reviewed important characteristics of 1080. Griffiths (1959) demonstrated that 1080 washes off grain and carrot baits readily in rain. There is a high degree of absorption to root tissues and other cellulosic materials, but it is decomposed abruptly by soil bacteria, apparently of the genus Pseudomonas. When leached into the soil, it may be translocated into plants, but most re- mains in the roots. Plants also decompose the compound (Hilton et al. 1969). Because soils possess a rich and diverse microfauna of organisms capable of degrading 1080, Lien et al. (1979:17) concluded that there seemed little likelihood of a long-term build-up of 1080 residues. When Compound 1080 is ingested by coyotes, it is primarily absorbed through the gastrointestinal tract (Crabtree 1962). It is not readily absorbed through intact skin. The consumed monofluoroacetate, that is not eliminated in urine, is converted into fluorocitrate, the lethal synthesis that inhibits citrate metabolism. Some fluorocitrate is also eliminated in urine. That which remains in the body ultimately blocks the citric acid or Krebs cycle and can cause death (Atzert 1971, Kun 1982, Rammell and Fleming 1982). Applied vertebrate ecologists classify 1080 as a slow-acting toxicant in contrast to strychnine and exceptionally fast-acting cyanide. In coyotes and other carnivores death from 1080 typically results from central nervous system disorders, with the animal presumably being unconscious prior to death, since they often run blindly into walls and fences(Batcheler 1978).